1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an information processing device, an information processing system, and a computer-readable recording medium which are adapted to emulate an application platform of an image forming device.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, an image forming device of a certain type, such as a multifunctional peripheral, is provided with an application platform, and the application platform is provided with APIs (application programming interfaces) which have been made public. Using this application platform, a third vendor develops applications and provide such applications to the market. A user of an image forming device can purchase some of the developed applications that are appropriate for his business, and can increase the efficiency of the business by installing the applications in the image forming device.
Similar to other general-purpose software programs, upgrading of the application platform is performed for the purpose of functional enhancement. There is also a case in which a completely new application platform in which a software architecture is fundamentally improved is developed.
When an upgraded application platform or a new application platform in which the software architecture is completely reformed (either of which will be called a new version platform) is released, it is desirable that applications which operate on the new version platform are ready for being provided to the market at the timing of releasing of the new version platform. In order to attain the goal, it is necessary for the third vendor to carry out the testing (or verification of operation) of the existing applications on the new version platform and the development work of a new application which operates on the new version platform, concurrently with the development of the new version platform.
Conventionally, in order to facilitate the development work, an emulator of the new version platform which operates on a PC (personal computer) has been supplied to the third vendor. The third vendor has conducted the testing or development of an application by using such an emulator. For example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2004-252585 discloses a program verification system which includes an in-circuit emulator (ICE) that emulates operation of an actual device.
However, the emulator merely acts on the application similar to the way the new version platform acts on the application, and the process which is performed in response to the call of the API is a dummy process. Therefore, the testing or development of an application on the emulator does not guarantee operation of the application with a high level of accuracy.
The testing of an application using such an emulator does not contribute to the testing of the new version platform at all, and there is a problem in that the development work is inefficient. If the testing of an application can be performed directly on the new version platform in the middle of development, both the application and the new version platform can be tested at once and the development work can be performed efficiently.
However, the manufacturers of image forming devices are hard to accept releasing of the new version platform to third vendors because there is a possibility of the outflow of their own software properties. For example, when a new version platform written in Java (registered trademark) language is implemented, one can easily decipher the byte codes of the new version platform.